Three Stars (2010)

"Three Stars" is set in an alien and exclusive world, withdrawn from most of us: the highly stylized gourmet restaurants and their often cramped and noisy kitchens. Focusing on nine Michelin starred chefs from three continents, skilled both in charming small talk with their guests and a gruff commanding tone towards their kitchen brigades. The film depicts the everyday life behind the scenes. Award-winning filmmaker Lutz Hachmeister's was privileged to observe the work of nine head chefs with stars in the Michelin Guide, cooking in France, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, Germany and Denmark, but also in the US and Japan. They are not only working in luxurious restaurants, but also in simple rural guest houses, rustic family farmhouses or profit-oriented hotel eateries. Hachmeister's main interest lies in the personality of the one, two, or three star chefs: Who are these men (and few women) that work 14 hours a day for decades to become master chefs? And most of all: Is it all really about the Michelin stars? Or rather, as a Japanese chef pensively notes, about the guests being contented and returning another day?